Oceana research: Amazon recycling claims and programs

• Amazon’s customers do not know that their plastic packaging is not accepted by their local recycling programs • Secret shoppers told that Amazon plastic is not accepted by Amazon's designated recycling drop-off points

In 2021, Oceana conducted a multi-part study in 25 cities in the U.S. and the UK to evaluate Amazon’s customerdriven recycling program. Oceana surveyed 1,400 Amazon Prime customers in these 25 cities to determine what they do with their Amazon plastic packaging. Oceana also sent mystery shoppers into 186 stores in these same cities – identified as recycling drop-off points for plastic packaging through links on the Amazon Second Chance website. The shoppers interviewed store employees and managers to find out if they would accept plastic packaging from Amazon for recycling and if store personnel were aware that Amazon is directing its customers to their stores to recycle their plastic packaging.

SURVEY: AMAZON PRIME MEMBERS AND AMAZON’S PLASTIC PACKAGING

Amazon’s plastic packaging is – as previously noted – a type of plastic known as plastic film –the “plastic shopping bag” category of plastic. Amazon writes on its sustainability website and report, that plastic film “Is a difficult material to process, and most municipal recycling programs do not accept it.”64

Amazon has created a program called “Amazon Second Chance” in the U.S. and the UK (https://www.amazon.com/ amsc). Customers who visit the Second Chance website and click on images of plastic packaging (such as the blue and white Amazon plastic mailer) are told that "some cities offer curbside recycling. Where not available, use designated store drop off locations where plastic film is accepted" and then provides a link to find "your drop off location."

When a customer clicks on the link, they are sent to plasticfilmrecycling.org (in the U.S.) or to “recyclenow.com” (in the UK). In the U.S., they are informed that plastic film typically does not get recycled in curbside bins. Amazon customers who visit these sites are encouraged to instead use drop-off locations for their plastic packaging – the plastic bag bins in stores. In Canada, visitors who click the link from Amazon Second Chance to plastic film recycling are likely to only be shown addresses for drop-off locations in the U.S.

Of the 1,400 Amazon Prime customers surveyed by Oceana, only 5.9% said they place Amazon plastic packaging in the plastic drop-off bins in the stores linked to the Amazon Second Chance website. Nearly 75%, reported that they either put their Amazon plastic in curbside recycling bins (39.4%) or in the trash (35.5%) which, given that plastic film

Amazon Second Chance web page.

put in a curbside recycling bin is largely landfilled means that 74.9% of the customers surveyed send – knowingly or not – their plastic packaging to the dump. Additionally, 19.3% say they "save their packaging" and later reuse it. Roughly 80% of the customers who said they put their Amazon packaging in the curbside recycling, reported that they did not know that their plastic would not be recycled. 70% of these customers reported that they were angry or surprised to find this out and 5% said they would consider canceling their Amazon Prime account because of this discovery (15% of the customers who reported shopping every day on the site said they would consider doing so). Nearly 95% of the Amazon customers surveyed are concerned about plastic pollution's impact on the oceans.

MYSTERY SHOPPER INVESTIGATION OF AMAZON RECYCLING DROP-OFF POINTS

The secret shoppers, hired by Oceana, who visited stores listed as participating in the plastic film recycling program used by Amazon reported that 41% of the stores visited would not accept Amazon plastic packaging and more than 80% of store managers were not familiar or did not know that Amazon was directing its customers to put plastic packaging in the plastic bag bins and were not certain how or what company took it away. The store managers who rejected Amazon plastic packaging made the following statements to the secret shoppers:

Plastic bag bin in store linked to by Amazon for disposal of Amazon plastic packaging, taken by a mystery shopper. Source: About Face "The store has never recycled Amazon packaging," then added, "We only recycle plastic bags here."

"At the end of the shopping center is a shipping company, and they might be able to take care of you.”

“There are some big recycling bins along the road you could look into placing your recycling into.”

It’s also worth noting that Amazon shoppers are being told to bring their packaging to stores and to find recycling bins that predominantly focus on plastic bags and in some cases discourage placing non plastic bags in the receptacle.

Additionally, secret shoppers reported seeing Amazon plastic packaging in only 17% of the 186 plastic bag bins inspected.

According to Oceana’s research, Amazon’s customers are highly concerned about plastic waste, very confused about what to do with the plastic packaging they receive from Amazon, and upset to learn that this plastic likely will not be recycled. And it seems likely that the customers who make a special trip to try and recycle their Amazon plastic packaging at the stores linked to by the company will be doubly frustrated based on Oceana’s secret shopper research and the uncertainty about whether or not the plastic put in these bins will be recycled.

INTERVIEWS WITH WASTE MANAGEMENT AUTHORITIES ABOUT AMAZON PLASTIC

Oceana interviewed local public works departments across the U.S. and the UK about what they do with plastic film and Amazon packaging. Those interviewed reported that the soft plastic is difficult to handle, gets caught in the recycling machinery and that there is not a strong market for buying recycled residential film.

A public works department representative in Salem, Massachusetts, said that, "You can't put (any soft film plastic) in the curbside recycling bin and that's just because it will get tangled up in the machinery." Another representative in Overland Park, Kansas, said the, "We don't take film or polystyrene. Difficult to handle. Small market." In San Martin, California, the representative explained the situation with a touch more color: "Recycle centers are all rejecting the plastic because it ruins the machines. The material is ruining the machines and costs money so now they are rejecting it and sending it to landfills." A representative from Brixton, London's municipal recycling center, explained, "Everything in your green wheelie bin gets taken to a larger facility, but they do not accept plastic bags, …and if there are any plastic bags in your wheelie, nothing inside can be recycled." Nine of 10 canvassed locations in the UK responded that plastic film is a nonrecyclable material.

According to Oceana’s research,

Amazon’s customers are highly concerned about plastic waste, very confused about what to do with the plastic packaging they receive from Amazon, and upset to learn that this plastic likely will not be recycled. photo credit